


Bad Dream

by untouchable



Category: Veronica Mars (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, College, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, Season 3, Sexual Content, Veronica POV, discussion of past childhood abuse, discussion of past rape
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-28 07:36:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20060380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/untouchable/pseuds/untouchable
Summary: As hot and bothered as Veronica gets when they’re tearing at each other, it’s these slivers of humanity that ultimately undo her.





	Bad Dream

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers up to 3x07.

Veronica’s drunk. Very, _ very _ drunk — not quite black-out wasted, but drunk enough that everything is blurry and dreamlike and _ good_. All the recent nightmares in her life—the rapes on campus and her dad’s affair and her own crumbling relationship—all of that feels so far away right now. She feels free. 

She also feels like she might be sick soon. Veronica says this out loud, and the man helping her in the door halts, lets out a muffled sigh. Everything spins for a moment, and she feels like she’s on the worst kind of roller coaster, but then her stomach settles. Even though it’s dark, she can tell they’re in Wallace’s dorm room now, where she’s been crashing for the weekend while Wallace and Piz are out of town. 

“False alarm,” she giggles, stumbling to the side, but a pair of arms go around her middle to steady her, and oh—it feels nice to be pressed against his chest like that. 

The man behind her smells like saltwater and peppermint gum. His hand is warm against her hip. She takes a shaky breath. Because she may be drunk, but Veronica _ knows _ who is behind her, who helped her up the stairs, who drove her back from that frat party tonight. 

“Lamb?” Her voice is a soft whisper. She’s certain she’s never said his name like that before, all breathy and...wait, why is he letting go?

“Go to bed, Mars.” 

She swallows, turning to face him. He’s in uniform, all that ugly brown material he usually wears, and it really shouldn’t turn her on the way it does. His face is obscured by shadows, but Veronica can feel his eyes on her. Lamb has this way of looking at her and making her feel naked, and in the darkness, just the two of them, it’s a dangerous thing. She doesn’t want to be vulnerable in front of him. Not again. 

“Why did you take me here?”

“You told me to. You didn’t want to go home. Remember?”

No, she doesn’t remember. The last few hours are just fragments—colorful, beer-soaked pieces of an attempt to drown her sorrows and lose herself. 

Veronica sits down on Wallace’s bed. Her feet hurt like hell, and she’s furious all of a sudden, at herself and at Lamb and just—all of it.

“Why were you even there?”

Lamb shifts, studying her face like he’s looking for something. “You called me.”

“I called the sheriff’s department on a party I was at?” Wow, as if the Greeks don’t hate her enough.

He clears his throat. “No,” Lamb says, quiet and firm, and Veronica’s head aches too much for her to really get what he means at first. “I came on my own. You sounded like...with what’s been happening with the girls here lately...” 

She lurches toward him. She has this frenzied idea of punching him right in the face, only she vastly miscalculates and gets him in the shoulder. Lamb doesn’t flinch.

“I haven’t been roofied. I’m just drunk, _ idiot_.”

Veronica tries hitting him again, but he grabs both her wrists. 

“I know that now.”

“You expect me to believe you? After _ everything _ you put me through when I was sixteen, you expect me to believe you came and helped me tonight because you thought someone slipped GHB into my drink and was going to _ rape _ me? What, did you suddenly develop a conscience overnight? Some much-needed morality, maybe? Or—”

Lamb sneers down at her. “Whatever. Just didn’t want to give you another reason to hate me.”

“Trust me, Sheriff, I already have all the reasons I need.”

Veronica shoves him as hard as she can. The huff of surprise that comes out of his mouth is satisfying, but then she’s being pulled down to the floor with him. The room tilts, her vision becoming dizzy and uncertain, and Veronica squeezes her eyes shut as she lays on the floor. She’s partially sprawled on top of Lamb, her face turned toward his neck, and she has the insane thought that it might be nice to stay like this forever. He’s a lot less awful when he’s not talking, and he’s warm, he smells nice, and once upon a time, years ago, a teenaged Veronica was dreaming of them in this very position under different circumstances. 

“I’m not fourteen anymore,” she says aloud.

He’s breathing harshly against her ear. “Yeah. I noticed.”

After a handful of moments, she feels Lamb playing with the ends of her hair, and the touch is so tender compared to everything else between them. On the floor, even the faint glow of moonlight is distant, and the darkness, being unable to see the exact expression on his face, makes her bold. Veronica takes her hand from where it’s been trapped against both of their stomachs. She presses one finger to the vein on the side of his neck, feeling his rapid heartbeat. She leans in, touching the tip of her tongue to his skin.

Lamb jolts under her, letting out a curse. His nose is against her temple and his knee has found it’s way between her legs, and if he would just move an inch then she’d be riding his thigh. Her hips wiggle a little, fire simmering in her lower belly, and she thinks he’s going to give her what she wants, what she needs—

But it’s never that easy.

His voice is rough and strangled when he tells her, “Not like this.”

Lamb leaves swiftly, without even a glance in her direction, and God, Veronica feels like such a fool. 

* * *

She tells herself that it was just a bad dream. 

* * *

A week goes by. Veronica goes to class, does her homework, tries to look Dr. Landry in the eye. She goes back to sleeping at her dad’s apartment and she investigates the rapes (and why the hell Logan thinks Mercer is so innocent when he won’t even tell her about the alibi), and she absolutely does _not_ think about how she practically begged Don Lamb to let her hump his leg. And the neck-licking? That totally didn’t happen either. 

In fact, Veronica’s so far down the river of denial that she doesn’t even notice that the Sheriff of Neptune is standing in front of her criminology class until he begins speaking. She looks up, slowly feeling like she’s in a nightmare and any minute now she’s going to realize that she came to school without pants on, but no, this is real. This was _ not _ on the syllabus. Yet Lamb is really here, is really giving a guest lecture to her class, and Landry is nodding along with whatever he’s talking about, only Veronica can’t understand a damn word Lamb’s saying because he keeps _ staring _ at her and _ smirking _ and—

She raises her hand. 

Lamb’s leaning against the blackboard, thumbs in his belt loop, and his eyes seem even bluer than normal under the harsh fluorescent lights. Following her lead, a few other tentative hands go into the air as Lamb remains silent. 

“You in the back—no, not you. _ You._ Small, blonde, _vicious_." Lamb jerks his chin toward Veronica. “Got a question?” 

Landry speaks up. “That’s Ver—”

“Veronica Mars,” Lamb drawls, and bolt of heat goes through her middle. 

“Right. One of my brightest students,” Landry says with a smile. “Please save questions until the end of the talk, Miss Mars.”

Lamb continues, and although Veronica wasn’t able to pester him the way she wanted, he’s not smirking anymore. So she calls that a win. 

“You know the hot sheriff?” some girl sitting next to her asks as they’re all packing their bags to leave.

“Unfortunately,” Veronica responds, watching him out of the corner of her eye as he shakes Landry’s hand and heads out of the door. 

Lamb’s waiting for her when she exits the classroom, and she tries to stifle the spark of pleasure when several girls throw her jealous looks. If only they knew who he really is—a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Or, in this case, lamb’s clothing. 

She breezes past him, shouldering her bag, but he easily catches up and falls into step beside her. 

“What’re you thinkin’ about?”

“Just how ironic your name is, considering you’re not very fluffy or cute or lamb-like,” Veronica cheerily replies. 

Lamb takes a pack of gum out of his back pocket. He looks amused. “What am I then? The big, bad wolf?”

She rolls her eyes. “Something like that.”

“What does that make you? One of the sheep? A piggy cowering in a straw house? Another barnyard animal?” He’s actually laughing at her. 

They’re in the middle of the grassy quad now, students milling all around, lots of witnesses. Veronica wonders if anyone would see, or care, if she tasers Lamb right now. She’d probably get in trouble, sure, but jail time would be worth wiping that stupid smirk off his face. 

“Walk me to my car?” he asks, breaking the silence. She realizes they’ve been just staring at each other for longer than what’s most likely deemed appropriate for archenemies. 

She scoffs. “No.”

“Why?”

Veronica makes a show of squinting and rubbing her chin, appearing to think really hard. “Oh! That’s right. Because I hate you.”

Lamb’s eyes light up, the corner of his mouth twitches, and Veronica knows she’s somehow walked into a trap. “Is that so?” he says, slow and easy, drawing the words out. “Because it seemed like you liked me plenty last weekend, Mars.”

She glances around, cheeks flushing red with embarrassment and rage and maybe something else. Veronica steps closer to him, lowering her voice. “That wasn’t—that had nothing to do with _ you_! You were just...you were _ there_, a tall, man-shaped person—that’s all.”

“Everyone’s tall compared to you,” Lamb mutters, but there’s this weird twist of fondness in his voice, and it makes her stomach flutter. 

She loathes how he can have this effect on her. 

“This is exactly why I’ll be planning your murder in my final paper for Landry’s class.”

Lamb flashes her a smile that’s all teeth. “I’m honored.”

They part ways, and later that night, under the covers, Veronica touches herself. She tries to think about Logan, tries to imagine him above her, but all she can hear is Lamb’s voice against her ear, all she can feel is him holding her in the darkness of Wallace’s dorm room. She orgasms, hard, biting her lip so that she doesn’t call out Lamb’s name.

* * *

Veronica questions Mercer down at the station, but he won’t give up the details of his alibi. She’s so frustrated, with Mercer and Logan and this whole case, that she storms down the hall, and suddenly she’s at Lamb’s office door without quite realizing how she got here. After a moment of hesitation, Veronica barges in.

Lamb’s at his desk doing something on his laptop—playing poker probably, because clearly he isn’t solving any crimes. He’s barely been doing anything to stop the rapist. It’s _ her _ who has been investigating and collecting evidence and just _ handing _ it over to him and _ still _ he won’t do the bare minimum of anything, how fucking typical—

She’s fuming, but Lamb takes his sweet time closing his computer and glancing up at her. 

“How’s our friend down in Cell B?” he asks. His casual, conversationally tone rubs her the wrong way, as always. 

“It’s not him,” Veronica bites out, closing the door behind her.

“And what makes you say that?”

“It just isn’t! I know someone who was with him and—why aren’t you out there trying to catch the real criminal, huh? All you ever do is sit on your ass and wait for _ me _ or my dad to do all the grunt work for you! Or, in some instances, you just sit on your ass and _ nobody _ does the investigating and so all the bad guys just walk away whistling!”

Lamb snorts, leaning back in his chair, eyes cool and uncaring. She balls her hands into fists.

“I'm serious, Lamb. I’m trying so hard and you’re not helping, like, _ at all_—I should be out doing normal college-girl things, but instead, I’m stuck—”

“Ah, Veronica Mars, the reluctant hero. I’ve got news for you, honey, you’re not shackled into this. There’s nothing _reluctant_ about you.” As he speaks, Lamb gets up, crosses the room, crowds her against the door. “If you were doing normal college-girl things, you’d be dead bored.”

She lifts her chin. “You don’t know anything about me.”

His breath smells minty, clean and cold and sharp, as he leans down toward her. “You’re wrong about that. I know that if weren’t for this case, then there’d be another one just as big you’d weasel your way into. Because being _ normal _ isn’t enough and even those little jobs you do for your dad and your friends don’t really cut it either. Lilly Kane, the bus crash, and now this...I think I’ve figured it out, figured _ you _ out, Veronica.” Lamb’s voice lowers to a whisper, like they’re sharing secrets. “I think you like all this. I think you might even be a little bit in love with it.” 

Veronica swallows. His words cut deeper than expected, and she wants to make him _ pay _ for it. 

She meets his eyes, steady and strong despite the tears leaking down her cheeks. “Does it make you feel better, Lamb? Hurting me?” she hisses. “Did you learn that from your dad?”

He freezes. For a single second, Veronica wonders if he’s actually going to hit her, but instead of the anger she’d anticipated, a flash of intense sorrow warps his features, there and then gone, fast as lightning. But she saw it, and she suddenly feels sick to her stomach. That was too far. 

Lamb takes a deep breath. Eyes narrowed, the muscle in his jaw working, he tells her, “Go home, Mars.”

She feels _ bad _ for him now, and she doesn’t want to feel bad for Don Lamb. So Veronica musters up some rage and grabs the front of his uniform. There’s something desperate in her movements, and she wonders if he can see that she’s so close to falling apart. 

“No! I just told you—if I don’t figure this out, no one will and—and—and I _ know _ what it’s like, okay? For those girls. It’s horrible and earth-shattering and it’s even worse knowing that the person who did it is still out there—”

“Mars.”

“—and I know you let us go that night at the Manning house because _ you _ know what that little girl was going through, but I just don’t understand how you went through your entire childhood being abused and how you can not care that these girls at my school are being—”

“Veronica!”

She’s found her way in his arms again, only this time it’s daylight and she’s _ not _ drunk and yet, it doesn’t matter somehow. She still wants him fiercely. Veronica presses her nose into the hollow of his throat and shudders. 

An eternity seems to pass before Lamb speaks. “I’m...fuck, I _ am _ sorry about how I treated you after Shelly Pomroy’s party.”

_ That’s not what this is about_, she wants to tell him. Only...it kind of is.

“I didn’t believe you, about what happened. I thought you wanted attention or...Jesus, I don’t know. But now...and I know you think everything I do is wrong, and maybe it is—I’m an asshole and sometimes I’m not good at this, at being a cop or hell, being a person. But I’m trying my fucking best, alright? Don’t know why you take it so damn personally when I do something shitty than when Sacks messes up or one of—”

She looks up. “You _ know _ why.”

Lamb’s eyes flicker over her face wearily. When he finds what he’s looking for, he touches their noses together lightly, breath fanning out over her cheeks, for just a moment before pulling completely away. The small gesture nearly makes Veronica start crying all over again. As hot and bothered as she gets when they’re tearing at each other, it’s these slivers of humanity that ultimately undo her. 

“Come on,” he sighs, grabbing his keys. “I’m driving you home. Again.”

* * *

She kisses him at a red light. For the rest of the ride, his hand rests on her leg, just above her knee. 

* * *

Her dad isn’t home—off working on a case or with Harmony, Veronica can’t be sure anymore—and Backup is asleep on the couch when she unlocks the door. 

“Some guard dog,” Lamb snorts, eyeing Backup as he continues to snore.

Veronica drops her bag to the floor. She doesn’t flip on the light switch. “Shut up,” she breathes, and Lamb's attention snaps back to her.

There’s heat in his gaze, raw and feverish, but he waits for her to make the first move. Veronica stands on her tip-toes, bodies almost touching but not quite, and meets his mouth with her own. Lamb inhales sharply, and she has the dizzying thought that maybe she’s made another error, calculated this all wrong, but then he’s kissing her back, tongue sliding into her mouth, and Veronica moans with relief. 

His hands are all over her, tangled in her hair, sliding down her back to cup her ass and align their hips so she can feel—oh. Lamb’s already hard against her stomach, she can feel the bulge through his pants, thick and heavy, and the knowledge makes her light-headed. 

She wraps one leg around his waist and he does the rest, picking her up with ease and all at once they’re the same height, Veronica’s looking him dead in the eye, and it’s so strangely intimate that she pauses. He licks his lips, bumping his nose against hers.

“Where’s your bedroom?”

“Straight down the hall.”

Lamb sets her down on her bed, gentler than she ever thought him capable of, and goes to kick the door shut.

“Your daddy gonna be home tonight?”

She swallows, sitting up a little. “Nope.”

Lamb nods, head turning as he surveys her room. “I always wondered what…” he starts to say, but then shakes his head, gaze returning to where she is.

Veronica pulls her shirt over her head. “Wonder about things later. Now is the time for getting naked, Sheriff.”

For once, Lamb doesn’t argue with her. 

He helps pull her jeans off, then makes quick work of his uniform, and okay, she’ll admit that he has a nice body, but he _ should _ for all the hours he spends _ not _ solving crime and pumping iron in front of a mirror. Veronica trails her hands over his shoulders, feeling the muscles flex and move as he climbs over her. Lamb leans down, pressing a series of kisses to her neck that swiftly turns into a trail of lovebites. She’s gonna have a handful of hickeys tomorrow, and Logan might see, anyone might see—Veronica decides she doesn’t care.

She slides her hands down to push at his boxers. Lamb unhooks her bra and together they get rid of their remaining underwear. When he settles on top of her this time, there’s no fabric between their bodies, just warmth and skin. She shivers. 

“Lamb,” she chokes out, “stop.”

He lifts his head to look at her. The lines of his face, which had softened, become harsh and unreadable. “Is this some kind of test?”

Veronica shakes her head, blonde hair spilling over the pillow. “N-no. I just...condom?”

Lamb blows out a breath. “Right. Fuck, almost forgot.”

She tells him where to find the box in the bathroom, and he’s back a second later, sliding the condom on. Veronica widens her legs so he can rest between them, but he kneels at the edge of the bed instead, and his grin is wolfish as he plants a chaste kiss to the inside of her thigh. She squirms as he licks a line toward the slit of her pussy. She’s almost embarrassed at how wet she already is, but then Lamb parts her with his thumbs and flicks his tongue against her clit, and Veronica doesn’t have the brain capacity to be ashamed anymore.

He huffs out a laugh against her lower belly. In the dim light, his mouth and chin is slick with her essence, and she feels oddly powerful and helpless all at the same time. 

“Stop moving. I’ve been told I’m good at this.”

For once, he isn’t lying. 

* * *

Her bones still feel like they’re made out of jelly when Lamb flips them so she’s straddling him on the narrow bed. She had kind of wanted to bask in the post-orgasm glow, but then he’s rubbing her clit in slow circles and she can feel his arousal against her ass and suddenly Veronica’s desire comes back in full-force. 

She peers down at their bodies as she lifts up a little, aligns her hips with his, and sinks down over his dick. One hand is gripping her waist, hard enough to bruise but she doesn’t mind, but the other jerks her chin up so their eyes meet. Lamb’s pupils are so big that his eyes look almost black, glazy with lust and disbelief and something else she can’t name. 

His voice is hoarse. “Look at me. I want you to know it’s me you’re fucking.”

Veronica nods and tries to do as he says, but as she inches down and fully stretches herself over him, she can’t help how her eyes flutter closed. Lamb starts moving, his abdomen rippling under her hand, and she rocks forward to meet his thrusts as they set a rhythm together. He pinches one of her nipples unexpectedly and she shrieks with the burst of pleasure with pain, and Lamb groans, planting his feet on the bed so he can fuck her harder. He does some obscene twist with his hips that makes Veronica see stars, a wave of heat consuming her, and she collapses against his chest as she comes. Lamb follows her over the edge a moment later. 

For a long time after that, the only sounds are their combined heavy breathing. 

* * *

“You know what this means, right?”

Lamb slides his hand through her hair. “I have a feeling you’re about to explain it to me."

“I’m calling you for rides all the time now.”

He smiles so wide his eyes crinkle a little in the corners. “You’re a terror, Veronica Mars.”

“That’s what they tell me."


End file.
